Marsha is charged with revamping an order-taking system where customers place or

Question

Marsha is charged with revamping an order-taking system where customers place orders to purchase products from Martin’s Mail Order Tools and Hardware Co.. The system requires customers to supply basic ordering information (e.g., part numbers for the products they desire, the quantity of items). It should capture information on the name, address and corporate affiliation of the person making the order, as well as information on the destination to which the order will be shipped. It should be able to price the order, factoring in sales tax (based on the tax rate of the State where the order will be shipped) as well as shipping/handling charges. Finally, it should capture credit card data and be able to authorize closure to the transaction. Once the transaction is authorized, the system should route the order request to the warehouse where products are stored and should route the payments data to the accounting department.    In an attempt to capture user requirements, Marsha contacts a broad range of users and asks for their inputs on what they would like to see incorporated in the new order-taking system. Following are some of the responses she gets: a. “The order-taking screen should be dynamic” b. “The system must have sufficient capacity.” c. “The rules must be flexible.” d. “When transactions are made, all interfacing systems should be updated.” e. “The application must be user-friendly.” Each of these “requirements,” as stated, is too vague to be useful. Restate each requirement in order to clarify what the requirement is really addressing.

Explanation / Answer

I will try to answer my best but this is sort of an opinion based question so the answer may vary from person to person.

a) The order-taking screen should be dynamic : The software should dynamically update if the items in the warehouse is not available or if the quantity of the item is low. If a new item arrived, it should dynamically update the screen to reflect that the part is now available which was not available previously and orders can now be taken for that item.

b) The system must have sufficient capacity : Suppose the same software is used by multiple users to take the orders, so the system must have enough capacity so it won't crash and can handle the requests reliably.

c) The rules must be flexible : Suppose if we want to implement a new feature, or a new item arrived, the rules must be flexible enough to easily accomodate that changes without changing the whole system.

d) When transactions are made, all interfacing systems should be updated. : This is an important characterstic. After transaction is complete, the list of items must update that the item quantity is reduced by the amount purchased. Just like that every other department must get the information so bad order doesn't get placed.

e) The application must be user-friendly : This is one of the most important requirement. Users handling the software are not developers. So the application must be user friendly for easy operations.

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